#Commentary of Olga Makeyeva on widespread refusal of AFU’s soldiers to participate in conflict in Donbass

14.07.2017

For more than three years, the criminal regime of Poroshenko has been telling Ukrainians about an undefeated army, huge queues of volunteers and the need to protect Ukraine’s ‘European choice’ from Russian troops whose presence in Donbass has not been proved yet.

But the reality was different: soldiers of the AFU in the “ATO” area understood that they were fighting in Donbass with their own people, not with the ‘Russian invaders’.

As long as the fratricidal wars are killing people on both sides, the Ukrainian oligarchs continue to enrich themselves on the blood of their own people. Realizing this, the AFU’s soldiers openly refuse to go to the “ATO” zone and participate in the war against the people of Donbass. It is increasingly difficult for the AFU’s management to conceal these cases, which are becoming endemic, and no fines or threats can rectify the situation.

Such tendencies in the army indicate that Poroshenko can be left alone with the unbroken republics tomorrow. The army is the last lever of pressure on Donbass, and, in case of losing it, Poroshenko will be forced to come to the negotiating table with the heads of the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics and to implement the Minsk agreements.